The "Middle East and Terrorism" Blog was created in order to supply information about the implication of Arab countries and Iran in terrorism all over the world. Most of the articles in the blog are the result of objective scientific research or articles written by senior journalists.

From the Ethics of the Fathers: "He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it."

Friday, November 9, 2012

My name is Manal al-Sharif. I’m from Saudi Arabia. I want to tell you about two separate chapters of my life.
Chapter one is the story of my generation; it begins the year I was born, 1979.

On November 20 of that year, there was a siege of Mecca, the holiest
shrine in the world for Muslims. It was seized by Juhayman al-Otaybi, a
militant Islamist, and some 400 of his men. The occupation lasted for
two weeks.
Saudi authorities had to use force—heavily armed force—to eject the
occupiers and end the violation. They beheaded Juhayman and his men
publicly.

Nevertheless, the authorities became very anxious. They feared
another uprising. Saudi Arabia was newly formed, rapidly changing, and
had been adopting a new civil way of life. For rebel militants, such
changes were against their beliefs, against Islam, and they wanted to
stop them.

So, although the Saudi government had executed Juhayman, it began to
abide by his doctrine. In order to prevent another uprising, extremists
in power quickly moved to roll back liberties that had been tolerated in
previous years.
Like Juhayman, some ruling Saudis had long been upset over the gradual
loosening of restrictions for women. In the weeks after the Mecca
uprising, female announcers were removed from television. Pictures of
women were banned. All possible female employment was narrowed to two
fields: education or healthcare.

Activities that encouraged male-female contact were curbed: Music was
banned; cinemas were closed; the separation between genders was
strictly enforced everywhere. That separation became law, from public
places to government offices, to banks, schools, even to our own houses.
In time, each house in Saudi Arabia ended up having two entrances: one
for men, one for women.

There was another sea change: Petrodollars began to pour into those
extremists’ pockets. They used that money to spread missionary teachers
around the world, many of whom preached hatred of the infidel,
dedication to global jihad, and a rejection of anyone who didn’t share
the same ideals.

Saudi Arabia’s Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention
of Vice, or “the religious police,” was also given a free hand in
society. In other words, the ruling authorities had beheaded a monster,
but they had enshrined his ideology of hate.

Saudi authorities tried their best to put the story of the rebellion
out of public memory, and so they moved to purge all articles and
records from magazines and newspapers, hoping that history would be
erased and people would forget about Juhayman.

But his memory remained. I remember one day, it was Hajj time and I
was performing tawaf with my mother. This is a ritual in which you walk
in circles around Kaaba, the most holy of Muslim shrines in Mecca. There
was a hole in one of Kaaba’s walls, and as we walked around, Mom
pointed to it and said, “That’s a hole from a bullet, from the time of
Juhayman.”

Juhayman. The name itself brings terror to Muslims around the
world. For me, that hole went beyond those walls. It went back in time;
it was like a hole that we Saudis fill in, and continue to fill in. And
so we keep going backward in my country.

The eighties went by, and the years after that brought the Afghan War
and historic events in the Soviet Union. In the meantime, the
extremists had become very powerful in Saudi Arabia, promoting their
ideas and forcing everyone to abide by strict rules.

Leaflets, books, and cassettes calling for jihad in Afghanistan and
insisting on ejecting all non-Muslims from the Arabian Peninsula were
given out freely. I was one of the youths recruited to distribute them. A
twenty-two-year-old man was among those fighting for jihad. His name
was Osama bin Laden. Such were the heroes of our time.
In the days of Sahwa—al-Sahwa al-Islamiyya, or the Islamic Awakening—one
of the main subjects of debate was women. I was taught that if I left
home, I would be fully responsible for any evil that would befall me,
because men cannot be expected to control their instincts. I am the
seductive fruit, they said, and I would seduce men in all my shapes and
forms. So I was made to stay home.

For Saudi extremists I was awra. The word awra means a
sinful thing, an intimate part of the body you should not show. It is
against the law to disclose it. By the time I was ten I was covering
myself fully.

My face was awra, my voice was awra. Even my name was awra.
Women cannot be called by name, so they are called “daughter of” a
man’s name, “wife of” a husband, or “mother of” one of her sons.

There were no sports for women, no engineering schools. There was
also, of course, no driving. And how could there be? We weren’t even
allowed to have identity cards with pictures, except for passports,
which were only necessary to leave the country.

We were voiceless. We were faceless. We were nameless. And we were completely invisible. Our lives had been stolen with a lie: We are doing this to protect
you from the prying eyes of men, they told us. You deserve to be treated
like a queen.

But during that time, something happened to show that not everyone
was going along with this. On November 6, 1990, forty-seven courageous
women emerged to challenge the ban on women driving. They went out into
the streets of Riyadh and drove. The women were detained, banned from
leaving the country, and dismissed from their jobs.
I remember receiving that news when I was a kid. We were told that those
women were really bad. Afterwards, there was a fatwa. The Grand Mufti
of Saudi Arabia said that a woman driving was haram, forbidden in
Islam. A television announcer came on to say that the Minister of the
Interior had warned that women were not allowed to drive in the Kingdom
of Saudi Arabia.

Al-Sharif delivering her historic speech in May 2012 at the Oslo
Freedom Forum. She was honored at the event with the Vaclav Havel Prize
for Creative Dissent. (Oslo Freedom Forum)

For the next twenty-two years, we were not even supposed to talk
about women driving, whether on television and news broadcasts, or in
magazines and newspapers.

So, yet another taboo was created.

The first had prevented us from talking about Juhayman; the second prevented us from talking about women driving.

But something else happened in that first chapter of my young life:
the attack on Khobar Towers, a housing complex for foreign military
personnel. The Towers were bombed on June 25, 1996, and, according to
the Saudi government, the attack had been carried out by Saudi Islamic
militants, including many veterans of the Afghan War. Nineteen US Air
Force personnel had been killed and 372 more people of various
nationalities injured.

I remember my mother gasping when she saw the pictures. “Juhayman is back,” she said.I was only seventeen, and it surprises me now to recall it, but I had
no sympathy for the dead. I was brainwashed, I had been brought up in a
particular time; I was the product of a terrorist culture.

The change in my life started four years later, in 2000. That year,
the Internet was introduced in Saudi Arabia. It was the first time I
went online. Now, let me give you a picture of myself: as an extremist, I
covered myself from head to toe. I had always followed that custom
strictly. I also loved drawing, but one day when they told us in school
that it was sinful to draw portraits of animals or people, I felt I had
to comply. I dutifully took all my paintings and drawings and burned
them. Meanwhile, I found myself burning inside. This was not fair. I had
learned as much from a computer.
The Internet, you see, was the first door for Arab youth to venture into
the outside world. I was young, thirsty to learn about other people and
other religions. I started communicating with people who held different
opinions, and soon those conversations raised questions in my head. I
began to realize how very small was the box I was living in. It looked
all the smaller once I stepped out of it. Slowly, I started to lose my
phobia of having my pure beliefs polluted.

Let me tell you another story. Do you remember the first time you
listened to music? Do you remember your very first song? I do. I was
twenty-one years old. It was the first I had ever allowed myself to
listen to music. I remember the song: It was “Show Me the Meaning of
Being Lonely,” by the Backstreet Boys.

Maybe it will help you to understand if I tell you that I used to
burn my brother’s cassettes in the oven. I was that extreme. And then I
listened to that song.

They had told us that music was Satan’s flute, a path to adultery, a
door to sin. But the song I heard sounded so pure, so beautiful, so
angelic. It could be anything but evil to me. It was then that I
realized how lonely I was in my isolated little world.

Another important moment for me was 9/11, a turning point for so many
people in my generation. When the events of 9/11 happened, the
extremists said it was God’s punishment to Americans for what they had
done to us over the years.

I was confused about which side to take. I had been brought up to
hate any non-Muslims or anyone who didn’t practice Islam as we viewed
it. But when I watched the breaking news that night, I saw a man
throwing himself from one of the World Trade Center towers. He was
falling, straight down, escaping the fire.

That night I couldn’t sleep. The picture was in my head, and it was
ringing a bell. Something is wrong, it was telling me. No religion on
Earth can be this bloody, this cruel, this merciless. Al Qaeda later announced their responsibility for the attacks. My
heroes were no more than horrifying, bloody monsters. It was the turning
point of my life.

After 9/11, Saudi Arabia faced a sweep of terrorist attacks on our
own land. The interesting outcome? A few months later, for the first
time, authorities started issuing women identification papers. Even
though an appointed male needed to give the permission, we were finally
being recognized as citizens in our own country.
***Which brings me to chapter two: driving for freedom. In this chapter,
the inspiration was the Arab Spring—for me as for so many of my
generation. I had been leaving my doctor’s clinic at nine o’clock one
night, and couldn’t find a ride home. A car kept following me and the
men in it almost kidnapped me. The next day at work I complained to my
colleague how frustrating it was that I have a driver’s license from
traveling overseas, but at home I’m not allowed to drive because I’m a
woman. He said the simplest thing: “But there is no law banning you from
driving.” A fatwa was a fatwa. Not a law. That plain truth ignited
everything. It was June 2011, and a group of women, Saudis all, decided
to start a movement, “Drive Your Own Life.”

It was to be a very straightforward campaign, using social media and
calling women to come out and drive on one single day, June 17. We
encouraged women with international drivers’ licenses only to
participate, as we didn’t want to cause accidents.

A video still of Al-Sharif driving in Oslo, an action forbidden in Saudi Arabia by a fatwa. (courtesy of Aftenposten TV)

That day, I recorded a video of myself driving. I used my face, my
voice, my real name. I was determined to speak for myself. I had once
been ashamed of who I was, a mere woman, but not anymore. When I posted
that video on YouTube, it got 700,000 views on the first day.

Clearly, I was not alone. On June 17, when we called for women to
come forward, some 100 brave women drove. The streets of Riyadh were
packed with police cars and religious police SUVs were posted in every
corner of the city. But of the 100 who drove, not one was arrested. We
had broken the taboo on driving.

The next day, I was arrested and sent to jail. A riot broke out
around Saudi Arabia, and people were divided in two camps: one called
for my trial and a flogging in a public place. They called me a whore,
an outcast, licentious, immoral, rebellious, disobedient, Westernized, a
traitor and double agent to boot. Pages sprang up on Facebook to
denounce me, claiming that men would take their igals, cords Arab men
wear on their heads, and thrash any woman who dared break the taboo and
drive. Women shot back, “We will throw shoes at you.” So it was a full
fight between genders.

I didn’t realize until after I was released from prison how many
people had been inspired by a simple act that many women do every single
day. The support that was rallied around the world led to my release
nine days later.

This is not about driving a car. It is about being in the driver’s
seat of our destiny. I now say that I can measure the impact we made by
how harsh the attacks were. It’s this simple: We’ve started a movement
in Saudi Arabia. We call it the Saudi Woman’s Spring.

We believe in full citizenship for women, because a child cannot be
free if his mother is not free. A husband cannot be free if his wife is
not free. Parents are not free if their daughters are not free. Society
is nothing if its women are nothing.

Freedom starts from within.

I am free. But I have to admit that when I go home to Saudi Arabia,
it’s not the same for everyone. The struggle has just begun.

I don’t know how long it will last, and I don’t know how it will end.
But I do know that a drenching rain begins with a single drop. And
eventually there are flowers.
This essay is adapted from Manal al-Sharif’s speech at the Oslo Freedom Forum in May 2012.

Manal al-Sharif is a women’s rights activist and one of the primary organizers of the Women2Drive campaign, which advocates for women’s right to drive in Saudi Arabia. Source: http://www.vqronline.org/articles/2012/fall/alsharif-driving/Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Some 57 percent of Israeli Jews preferred Romney, only 22% Obama (in my sector of American Israelis it was even more lopsided, a full 85% having cast absentee ballots
for the challenger, only 14% for the incumbent). So, naturally, for the
most part, November 7, 2012 was not a day of celebration in Israel.

Israel, too, has elections coming up—on January 22. That has prompted
speculations that Obama will now throw his weight behind Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu’s left-of-center challengers. There are precedents
for it, most notably in 1999 when President Bill Clinton sent a team of
PR strategists Stanley Greenberg, James Carville, and Robert Shrum to
help out Ehud Barak, then challenging Netanyahu (in his earlier term)
from the left. Barak won by a narrow margin.

The difference is that this time, according to all polls so far, the
right-of-center bloc that Netanyahu heads will win at least as
decisively as it did in 2009. The left-wing challengers (some of them
again being helped by Greenberg)
are already crowing that the Netanyahu-Obama tensions are the former’s
fault, and he thereby endangers Israeli-U.S. relations. Some say Obama
will exploit this to stir fears among Israelis and shift the balance to
the left.

It seems, though, that even if he tries, he won’t succeed; Israelis’
perception of a dangerous Middle Eastern environment, and of Netanyahu
as a leader realistically attuned to it, is too strong.

Then there is the Palestinian issue. Will second-term Obama make a
renewed pitch to get a state for the Palestinians—clearly one of his
most burning aspirations when he took office?

Some say that, freed of concerns about the Jewish vote (which proved
unfounded anyway), Obama will now go all-out to create another Arab
state squeezed up beside a truncated Jewish one, claiming all the while
that this is the greatest blessing Israel could hope for. Others contend
that Obama, burned by experience, now realizes the pitfalls of such an
attempt and, apart from rhetoric, won’t really embark on it.

Again, even if he does—while it may well involve further frictions
with Israel and public castigations—it won’t get anywhere, for the same
reason it didn’t the first time, and never has since 1937: the
Palestinians aren’t interested in a compromise.

That leaves Iran.

Does Obama “have Israel’s back” on Iran, and is he prepared to do
whatever is necessary, including the military option if all else fails,
to stop this regime from going nuclear?

Or is he actually a softy on all Islamic radicals other than Al
Qaeda, into cutting the defense budget rather than launching another
war, and likely to seek a “grand deal” with Iran that will absolve him
from taking any real action?

The dangers of the second possibility were well articulated on Wednesday by Israeli commentator David Weinberg, who noted:

A U.S.-Iran agreement could involve tacit recognition of
Iranian hegemony in the Gulf region and acceptance of its nuclear
status, in exchange for a long-term freeze in Iran’s enrichment of
uranium to high levels. This would leave Ahmadinejad’s nuclear
development facilities, including the Fordow underground center, intact,
instead of dismantling them. This would allow the Iranians to continue
refining their nuclear skills. Even at low levels of enrichment this
provides a framework with which Tehran can bypass Western restrictions
and hoodwink Western inspectors.

This despite the fact, Weinberg points out, that

Iran has clandestinely crossed every “red line” set by
the West over the past 20 years…and has gotten away with it. So any deal
that scales back sanctions and allows Iran to keep operating its
advanced nuclear development facilities, even at a low level, is a fatal
bargain.

Under such a scenario—with Obama having grandly proclaimed a
successful deal while Iran keeps progressing toward the bomb under
cover—would Netanyahu, now truly standing alone, make good on his vow to abort such progress by military means if necessary?

These questions stand to be answered in the rest of 2012 and in 2013. Meanwhile, Israel is not celebrating. P. David HornikSource: http://frontpagemag.com/2012/davidhornik/israel-and-u-s-on-a-collision-course/Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Should Obama revert to his earlier approach of continuously, and publicly reprimanding Israel whilst treating the duplicitous Palestinian leaders with kid gloves, he could bring about a confrontation with Congress.

Bedfellows. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be obliged to endeavor to overcome the personal animosity which bedeviled his relationship with Obama.

|Photo credit: AP

Being in the U.S. this week during the elections has truly been a remarkable experience and a roller coaster. The outcome is that, for better or for worse, the American people have determined that President Barack Obama will serve a second four-year term as leader of the Western world.

Aside from Americans, this will probably impact more on us in Israel than any other nation because of our heavy reliance on U.S. political and military support. But the die has been cast and everyone, including those of us who were deeply apprehensive about how a second term Obama would relate to us, must accept the verdict of the American people.

Our government should now concentrate on devising a strategy to maximize a meaningful relationship with the second Obama administration without compromising our security or independence. This will not be easy but it is achievable so long as we behave rationally. American grass-roots support for Israel remains strong and Congress does not abandon us.

Despite that most politicians routinely abrogate pre-electoral promises, we should act on the initial assumption that Obama will behave honorably and broadly adhere to the positive undertakings relating to Israel that he constantly reiterated over the past six months. He should be reminded that in the course of the last debate with Romney, he went so far as to say “Israel is a true friend. … It is our greatest ally in the region. And if Israel is attacked, America will stand with Israel.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be obliged to endeavor to overcome the personal animosity that bedeviled his relationship with Obama and contributed to the troublesome tensions that exacerbated differences between both countries over the past four years.

We should be heartened by the fact that Obama’s “charm campaign” and pragmatic pro-Israeli policies designed to obtain support from American Jews during the pre-election period, suggest that he is not necessarily committed to an ideological anti-Israeli agenda.

Hopefully, from Obama’s vantage, he may have appreciated that bullying or demeaning Netanyahu was counterproductive and in fact strengthened rather than undermined his popular support In Israel.

He must also be aware that over the past few years, despite some erosion within the Democratic party, Congress remains overwhelmingly supportive of Israel, reflecting the record levels of support that Israel enjoys overall with the American people. Should Obama revert to his earlier approach of continuously and publicly reprimanding Israel while treating the duplicitous Palestinian leaders with kid gloves, he could bring about a confrontation with Congress.

By now, Obama may also have independently reached the conclusion that by distancing the U.S. and exerting harsh pressure on Israel, all he achieved was to embolden radical Islamists and encourage the Palestinians to become more intransigent in their demands.

Moreover, after burning itself on so many occasions in its former failed Middle East policies, the new administration may well decide to distance itself from seeking to resolve the intractable Arab-Israeli conflict.

We should therefore, at least at the outset, adopt a positive approach to the new administration and assume that Obama will adhere to his commitments and that the improvement in relations with Israel created over the past six months will be sustained.

However it is important for pro-Israel activists to be prepared immediately to raise their voices should Obama renege on his electoral undertakings.

This applies particularly in relation to Obama’s passionate pledge that Iran would never be permitted to obtain a nuclear bomb under his watch. He stated repeatedly “As long as I am president of the United States, Iran will not get a nuclear weapon.”

Israel must also, if necessary, be prepared to initiate a public campaign to explain our position should Obama revert to insisting that the indefensible 1949 armistice lines serve as the opening benchmark for negotiations with the Palestinians.

In addition, American Jewish leaders — presumably led by AIPAC — must as a priority, launch a major campaign to reinforce the traditional pro-Israeli attitude relationship of the Democratic party. Such a course of action would have been equally imperative had Romney been elected.

At a grass roots level there is now unquestionably a growing far-left minority emerging within the Democratic party that is indifferent and, in many cases, outright hostile to Israel. It received a boost from the Obama Administration when it sought to distance itself from Israel to appease the Arabs.

These trends were accelerated by agitation from Jews bitterly opposed to the Israeli government, as exemplified by Jeremy Ben-Ami, head of J Street, who claims to have a better understanding of what is good for Israel than Israelis, themselves, and journalist Peter Beinart, who is adored by the liberal media and calls for a global boycott of Israeli settlements. Ignoring the fact that today, subject to the Palestinians recognizing Israel’s security needs, a consensus prevails in Israel favoring a two-state policy — these Jews have been continuously trying to persuade elements within the Democratic party that Israel was the intransigent party and the obstacle to achieving a peace settlement in the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The growing influence of anti-Israeli factions within the Democratic party was evident in the course of the party’s recent National Convention with the deletion of positive references to Israel which had traditionally been incorporated in the conference declaration. It was also highlighted dramatically by the chilling and unprecedented booing that greeted the reinsertion of a section recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

The reinforcement of bipartisanship towards Israel is crucial, because if elements hostile to Israel become dominant or even influential among either of the two mainstream parties, it would undermine one of the strongest foundations sustaining the U.S.- Israel alliance. That the majority of Jews continued to support Obama in the elections should strengthen the ability of Democrats seeking to marginalize the anti-Israeli elements and restore the standing of Israel in the Democratic party.

We may be facing difficult times. But we must remain optimistic in the knowledge that the United States is a democracy. As long as public opinion continues to support Israel, the relationship between both countries may, as in the past, undergo strains and stresses, but will remain intact.

Obama was elected to a
second term, and Israel will likely face a tough diplomatic road due to
disagreements over a fitting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict. The American president has demanded in recent years that
Israel immediately fix the historical injustice to the Palestinians —
caused according to the president by the creation of Israel — by
creating an independent Palestinian state.

Such a step, however,
could lead to a Hamas takeover of the newly created state, attacks on
cities in central Israel and harsh Israeli retaliations that could
spiral the entire region into severe hostilities. Meanwhile, this
concern hasn't prevented prominent officials in Israel (mostly on the
Left), namely President Shimon Peres, from enthusiastically pushing the
measure forward, which could prove to be destructive for both peoples.
Unrestrained political ambition is capable of blinding some people.

Alongside the dangers
on the diplomatic front, Israel must prepare for a global economic
crisis during Obama's second term — a crisis that has already begun
hindering Israeli exports. The crucial measures on the diplomatic front
are obviously dependent on cooperation from outside factors that we
can't control. However, we have a great deal of control in regards to
dealing with our domestic problems, specifically the economy, which is
the basis for Israel's power, including its military strength.

But it seems that due
to the immense pressures caused by external problems (of which the
Likud-Yisrael Beytenu coalition is an indicator), the Israeli government
cannot find the time or strength to implement essential reforms which
have a proven ability to quickly improve our situation and which would
help the country to withstand the difficult pressures it will soon face.
The past has taught that delaying implementation of reforms can lead to
missing them altogether. Much damage has already been done relating to
the effectiveness of reforms in the concentration of wealth and market
control, despite it being a measure initiated by Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu with the support of the Bank of Israel.

The time to prepare the
reforms is now, so that after the Israeli elections, the prime minister
can immediately devote part of his extremely busy schedule to moving
them forward. This way, the economy will become more efficient and
Israel will be able to successfully deal with the threatening global
economic crisis.

Economic reforms are vital because, to keep up
with the increasing competition during a global crisis, Israel must
become more efficient and lower its bloated production costs, which are
affected by high concentration of wealth and market control, tax rates,
cost of living, monopolistic labor unions, and cost of raw materials and
services compared to abroad. A reduction in exports, which account for a
third of the country's national revenue, could cause a severe economic
crisis in Israel and mass unemployment.

There’s little doubt that Israeli Prime Minister
Netanyahu wasn’t celebrating President Obama’s re-election, but he has
more important things on his mind today than commiserating with his old
Boston colleague Mitt Romney. Netanyahu’s priority is his own
re-election campaign. But with Obama now in place for the next four
years, speculation centers on whether that makes it less likely that the
prime minister can skate to an easy victory in the Israeli balloting
scheduled for the day after Obama takes the oath of office again in
January.

Most Israelis understand that among any prime minister’s most
important tasks is maintaining close relations with their country’s only
ally, the United States. Many of Netanyahu’s foes, including American
Jewish left-wingers, have spent the last four years hoping that the
clashes between Obama and the prime minister would sooner or later
undermine his grip on power and either topple his government or sink him
at the next election. Yet despite years of often non-stop fights picked
with him by the Americans, Netanyahu has prospered. The question now is
whether Obama’s victory changes the equation enough to actually place
Netanyahu in political jeopardy. But while the certain prospect of four
more years of clashes between the two leaders ought to trouble both
Israelis and Americans, Netanyahu probably hasn’t too much to worry
about.

If Obama were to signal his hope that somebody other than Netanyahu
would win in January it wouldn’t be all that unusual. Israelis and
Americans have been interfering in each other’s elections for decades
with the latter generally having a lot more impact on the opinions of
Israeli voters than the reverse. The disfavor with which the
administration of the first President Bush regarded Yitzhak Shamir was
thought to have materially contributed to the Likud prime minister’s
defeat in 1992. Seven years later, Netanyahu’s first stay in the prime
minister’s residence was cut short in no small measure because of
President Clinton’s obvious disdain for him.

Netanyahu was widely criticized at home this fall after publicizing
Obama’s refusal to meet him in New York during the opening of the United
Nations General Assembly to discuss setting “red lines” about diplomacy
with Iran. The prime minister’s comments about the time were seen as an
effort to undermine Obama during his own re-election campaign, and many
Israelis were uncomfortable with the intervention as well as the
prospect of their prime minister being seen as trying to pressure the
United States into conflict with Iran.

But there are two problems with the idea that Obama’s undisguised
animosity for Netanyahu will have a major impact on the Israeli
election.

The first is that although Netanyahu’s political position looks a lot
less secure than it did only a couple of months ago, there is still no
plausible alternative to him in the field.

Netanyahu would probably have been better off going to early
elections last spring rather than attempting to make a super coalition
with Kadima work. That effort was doomed by Kadima’s futile attempt to
revive its fortunes at Likud’s expense. Had the prime minister passed on
that experiment, elections would have probably already been held and he
would be now safely re-elected with Obama having nothing to say about
it.

I also agree with those who argue that Netanyahu’s recent decision to
merge the Likud with Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party may
yield his party less seats than the current combined total of the two
groups. Netanyahu’s determination to consolidate the right behind his
banner will allow his opponents to portray him as being in the pocket of
extremist forces rather than as the leader of the center-right
coalition. Yair Lapid’s new party may benefit from this realignment, in
which it can gain more votes in the center.

But those expecting a new super party of centrists and various
left-wingers to take on Netanyahu, with some failed politician like Ehud
Olmert or Tzipi Livni at the helm, are probably dreaming. None of those
likely to lead opposing parties are seen as even remotely having a
chance to defeat Likud. Moreover, even if the Likud/Lieberman alignment
loses seats, polls show the current coalition parties from the
nationalist and the religious camps still easily winning a majority in
the next Knesset.

Nothing Obama can say or do will make any of the alternatives to
Netanyahu a realistic alternative and the president probably understands
he would be foolish to try.

Second, and even more important, for all of the fear that Israelis
have of the idea of there being daylight between their country and the
U.S., they dislike and distrust Obama far more than they worry about
Netanyahu. Every spat with Netanyahu strengthened the Israeli because
most of the fights Obama picked were on issues on which the prime
minister was able to defend the Israeli consensus, such as Jerusalem.
Were he to start sending signals that he wants Netanyahu defeated, most
Israelis would rightly interpret that as a prelude to more pressure on
their country to give on such issues and that would, as it has
throughout the last four years, strengthen rather than weaken Netanyahu.

The prime minister faces a tougher fight now than he might have had
if the elections had come sooner or it Romney had won the American
election. But Netanyahu remains a prohibitive favorite to win his own
new four-year lease on power. The prospect of four more years of
Obama-Netanyahu spats is disturbing, especially if Obama seeks to
compromise on a nuclear Iran or hasn’t learned his lesson about the
Palestinians’ disinterest in peace. But it isn’t likely that there is
anything Barack Obama can do to prevent a Netanyahu win in January.Jonathan S. TobinSource: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/11/07/obama-win-wont-derail-netanyahu-israeli-elections/Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

President Obama has now fought his last election
and no longer needs to submit himself and his accomplishments to the
voters. Accordingly, all bets are off as to how far the president will
push his foreign policy agenda on Iran, Russia, the Palestinians and Israel,
and Islamist regimes in general. Perhaps there will be even more open
U.S. outreach to Hamas, and perhaps American diplomats will soon get
their wish to sit-down with Hezbollah.

Today, Frank Ricciardone, the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, announced that Obama’s first trip of his second term will be to Turkey, a country which has witnessed under its increasingly Islamist government
an unprecedented roll back of basic freedoms. The Turks are looking at
Obama’s choice as an endorsement. They are probably right. On top of
this, Ricciardone’s announcement comes right after Turkey’s Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced that he would soon travel to Gaza, in recognition and support of Hamas.

Votes matter. How ironic it is, therefore, that Obama chooses to embrace most those governments and entities where they don’t.Michael RubinSource: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/11/07/obama-first-trip-doubling-down-on-islamism/Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Barack
Obama has won the 2012 presidential race. We will hear from the left
that this amounts to America's rejection of conservative principles. The
media will posit that the American people heard Mitt Romney's message,
thought about it from each and every angle, and decided on principle and
merit to support the president.

Of
course, nothing could be further from the truth. For millions of
Americans who pulled the lever for Obama in this election, there was
never any contemplation about ideology or the merits of Mitt Romney's
message. And this election certainly does not signify a center-right
nation's rejection of center-right conservatism in favor of Obama's
leftist extremism. No, what this election signifies is that we
conservatives can no longer find solace in the comforting hope that
there are enough rational people in this country to overcome the
ideologically infected social engineers that cannibalize American
liberty while leading their mindless flock to worship at the
redistributive altar.

This
mindless flock of the Democratic base is simply too large in terms of
sheer numbers, and too far removed from reasonable perception to do
anything other than vote for more collectively subsidized "stuff,"
whether it's food stamps, unemployment checks, health insurance, or
contraception and abortions. For them, the impulse to vote Democratic is
more a conditioned Pavlovian response than a result of thoughtful
exploration. The conditioned stimulus (promises of government
entitlements) is coupled with an unconditioned stimulus (free food via
food stamps, for example), and in time, either stimulus will, like
clockwork, produce the response of a vote for the name that appears on
the Democratic ticket.

This
is tragic not only for political reasons, but for humanistic ones as
well. It is precisely our ability to think and reason as individuals
that makes us human. And effectively, the Democratic Party has
systematically dehumanized a large part of its constituency by making
them obedient dependents -- unable to reason, robbed of individualism in
a manufactured groupthink culture, and relegated to the graciousness of
a benefactor who claims to have their best interests in mind. In the
best way of describing them is as entranced cultists. In the worst, they
are willing slaves.

However
one might choose to describe them, Barack Obama has certainly been
efficient in his efforts to garner their devotion. Taking food stamps
alone as an example, he has added more than 15 million new dependents to
the government rolls in his tenure as president, each of which now has a
vested interest in voting Democrat -- it is their job, and the source
of their livelihood. It is only logical to assume that few among them
have the good sense to consider, say, a continuation of rising food and
energy costs that an Obama re-election portends. Why would they, when
they have been conditioned to feel entitled to both if they are without,
regardless what it might cost taxpayers? No, these dependents likely
never mustered a thought beyond the conditioned assumption that a
Democratic vote preserves a continued right to free food. One Twitter
user going by the handle @_MaliksWright articulates this position
nicely, laced with one of many death threats against Mitt Romney that
have been curiously uninteresting to the media at large:

Food
stamps are such a beautiful thing. Romney better hope he lose tomorrow,
I cock my gun on his ass he take MY food stamps away lol

Certainly,
there are millions of those not on the government dole that vote
Democrat because the concepts of "fairness" and "social justice" are
simply more important to them than those guidelines for liberty
enumerated by the Constitution. Count them among the clergy in the
progressive cult. But this election has made it as clear as ever that
the misguided progressive ambition rests squarely on the shoulders of
this army of dehumanized dependents. Every election, we see the
intellectual leaders of the self-proclaimed "free thinking" Democratic
left unashamedly goad the opiate-and-compliant rabble to the polls with
promises of free government handouts -- and this one was no different.

There might be humor in the irony of that, if it were not so shameful and sad.

But
it is on the strength of millions of such votes, and only on the
strength of millions of such votes, that Democrats can carry such narrow
victories as we saw in the presidential election of 2012.

I
wish there was a silver lining here, but there is not. With increasing
dependency upon the government comes increasing difficulty in defeating a
Democratic presidential candidate at the national level. We need but
look at Obama's "Life of Julia"
slideshow to verify that this is precisely what he has in mind, and as
we taxpayers are doomed to endure the full scope and measure of
ObamaCare taking effect in the coming years, the wheels are already in
motion for American dependency upon the government to unprecedentedly
expand. And with it, the chances of a return to conservative governance
predicated on individualism and limited government are vastly
diminished. In a time very soon, those chances might be nil.

The
completion of Obama's fundamental transformation of America is nearly
at hand. And we who value what America once represented rightfully mourn
its coming demise

William Sullivan blogs at http://politicalpalaverblog.blogspot.com/and can be followed on Twitter.Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/11/barack_obama_and_the_cult_of_dependency.htmlCopyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

The EU has been here before.
During the same period they came up with their false wall-of-separation
within Hezbollah, they they did the same thing with Hamas. The fiction
disappeared in Europe because it was no longer possible to allow a group
to operate which blew up buses full of civilians.

However bad many Americans think that the Obama administration is on
security matters, at least one thing can be said in their favor: they
are not Europeans.

An advisor to President Obama last week condemned the European
Union's weakness on security issues, and one, in particular, namely its
disgraceful and pusillanimous behaviour on what should be an
open-and-shut case.

Speaking in Dublin last Saturday, the chief counter-terrorism adviser
to President Obama, John Brennan, criticized the European Union for its
complete failure to stand up to the terrorist group Hezbollah.

It will be amazing to many Americans – and indeed to many Europeans –
that the group remains able to operate, recruit and raise funds within
the EU. In America, which like France, felt the full brunt of Hezbollah
activities in Beirut in 1983, the organization has long been banned in
any and all of its guises. This last August Washington, which already
sanctions and classifies Hezbollah as a foreign "terrorist
organization," additionally put the group on a list of organizations
under sanctions for involvement in the slaughter being carried out in
Syria by Bashar al-Assad's regime. As Brennan added, in addition to its
involvement with terrorist activities carried out by Iran, Hezbollah "is
training militants in Yemen and Syria." Even that does not do justice
to the scope, range and history of Hezbollah's ambitions.

In the EU however, the group is able to fundraise unhindered. This
appalling fact has come about because of an entirely false distinction
which the EU continues to observe. It is a distinction entirely of its
own invention.

For the EU claims that there is a difference between the "political"'
and the "military" wings of Hezbollah. Therefore as long as the
"political" side of their activities is being pursued the EU considers
it legitimate activity. Of course there is a striking fact here: nobody
outside the EU believes there is any such internal distinction within
Hezbollah. The American government does not see it; the Canadian
government does not see it. The governments of Iran and Syria do not see
it. The people of Lebanon do not see it. And of course Hezbollah itself
certainly does not see it.

For the leadership of Hezbollah the issue of its legitimacy within
the EU is a source of considerable satisfaction. Where would Hezbollah
be without the EU? The Secretary General of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah,
has already made it very clear where they would be. A few years back
Nasrallah said that if the EU designated Hezbollah as a terrorist group
in its entirety it would "destroy" the organization; as Nasrallah put
it, "[t]he sources of our funding will dry up and the sources of moral,
political and material support will be destroyed."

Any other political entity in the West would recognize that as an
invitation. But for the EU it is a terrible warning. For one of the
reasons why the EU continues to argue for a political-military divide is
that proscribing the fictitious "political wing" of Hezbollah would
risk destabilizing Lebanon. Anybody who knows anything at all about
Lebanon might observe that Hezbollah is doing perfectly nicely at
destabilizing Lebanon already. Hezbollah's parallel state within
Lebanon, its private army and road-blocks, its blackmailing of its
opponents and its bribery of those it wishes to keep it in power is
destabilizing enough. And that is not even to mention the deeply
"stabilizing" (if you are the EU) effects that the group must have as
they carry out assassinations of opponents, bombings in civilian areas
and so on.

The EU has been here before. During the same period they came up with
their false wall-of-separation within Hezbollah they did the same thing
with Hamas. That terror group too, they decided, had a military and a
political wing. After the atrocities of the Second Intifada, however,
that fiction disappeared. It did not disappear because the EU was made
aware of something it had previously been unaware of. It disappeared in
Europe because it was no longer possible – in terms of public opinion or
political expediency – to allow a group to operate which blew up buses
full of civilians.

Of course in July this year an Iranian proxy of some kind – believed
by many to be Hezbollah – did exactly that on European soil. The bombing
of a bus of Israeli tourists in Bulgaria showed that Iranian proxies
like Hezbollah are not only willing but able to use within the EU the
tactics they have used for years in the Middle East and, in the case of
Hezbollah, as far away as Buenos Aires in the 1990s.

That the same EU which has seen a member country attacked by such
terror should continue to permit such terrorists to recruit and
fundraise on EU soil is an utterly unsustainable position. The
distinction will break down, but it will have to be pushed. Recently in
Dublin John Brennan did some of that pushing. He described the European
stance on Hezbollah as something that "makes it harder to defend our
countries and protect our citizens."

He is right, and should be applauded for stating the case. The EU
will have to listen. The only question is how long they remain willing
to help Hezbollah in its last European hurrah.Douglas MurraySource: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3436/eu-hezbollahCopyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

As the richer center-right
regions are increasingly unwilling to pay for the poorer leftist
regions, the strain on multi-ethnic nations in Europe is growing. We
might very well see an entirely different Europe – with a handful of new
nations – five years from now. Washington would be wise to take this
possibility into serious consideration.

On November 25, Catalonia, the richest region of Spain, will hold
regional elections. Artur Mas, the leader of the regional government, is
campaigning on a platform demanding more autonomy for Catalonia. Mr.
Mas's government in Barcelona called early elections in an effort to
attain greater independence from Madrid.

Spain is divided into 17 autonomous entities, of which only 14 can be
considered truly Spanish. Two states have their own language, Catalonia
and the Basque Country, while in a third state, Galicia, a dialect of
Portuguese is spoken. Like the Basques, many Catalans are striving for
independence from Spain. The independence movement has been growing
since the economic crisis hit Spain.

Catalonia encompasses less than 6.5 percent of Spain's territory. Its
7.5 million inhabitants comprise 16% of Spain's population. However,
its GDP constitutes almost 20% of Spain's. Over the past years
Catalonia's economy has been contracting, though at a less dramatic rate
than the overall Spanish economy. The Catalans resent the fact that
each year they are forced to transfer about 8% of their GDP to other
Spanish regions because the central government in Madrid demands that
Catalonia help support the poorer regions of Spain.

The Catalans claim that this enforced form of "solidarity" is harming
their own region. Every year the Catalans pump some $20 billion more in
tax revenue into the central government's coffers than they receive in
return. Like the rest of Spain, the eurocrisis has cast Catalonia into
heavy debt. When Madrid recently turned down Barcelona's request for a
no-strings-attached bailout of $6.2 billion, angry Catalans began to
clamor for secession from Spain.

Last September 11th, a staggering million and a half of the 7.5
million Catalans joined a pro-independence demonstration in the streets
of Barcelona, shouting No Vull Pagar – I don't want to pay.

While in the past, the arguments in favor of Catalan independence
were mostly cultural and had to do with the need to preserve Catalan
national identity, today the arguments have become financial. They have
to do with the need to safeguard Catalonia's economic prosperity. The
mostly center-right Catalans do not want to subsidize regions over whose
– often leftist – economic policies they have no influence.

A similar phenomenon can be observed in Flanders, the most prosperous
region of Belgium. The Dutch speaking Flemish are increasingly averse
to supporting the French speaking Socialist southern part of Belgium,
which is in economic decline. A conservative Flemish-nationalist party,
the ideology of which resembles that of Artur Mas's Convergence and
Union party in Catalonia, won the recent local elections and has taken
over the city council of Antwerp, Belgium's economic powerhouse.

In Italy, too, the economically stronger North – so-called Padania –
is increasingly reluctant to subsidize the poorer South. The Lega Nord,
the largest party in many parts of northern Italy, wants to lead Padania
to independence.

The unwillingness of the richer northern parts of Belgium, Spain and
Italy to pay for the southern parts is mirrored on the pan-European
level by the unwillingness of the North to pay for the South. Indeed, as
the Financial Times has noted, many Germans are wondering why they should support poorer Spanish regions if even the Catalans object to it.

It is a legitimate question: the point that the North is richer than
the South cannot be attributed to natural phenomena beyond the people's
control. On the contrary, politicians in the South have for decades been
pursuing wrongheaded Socialist policies, showering their voters with
subsidies, in the knowledge that if these policies led to bankruptcy the
North would foot the bill.

Last October, the Catalan regional parliament decided to stage a
"public consultation" on Catalonia's future. The word "referendum" was
carefully avoided: under the Spanish Constitution of 1978, a referendum
on regional independence is prohibited. Even a referendum probing the
Catalan voters about their views on greater fiscal autonomy is illegal.

The Catalan initiative was immediately slammed down by Spain's central government and parliament. The Cortes,
Spain's national parliament in Madrid, overwhelmingly voted down a
proposal to allow the Catalonians to hold a referendum with 276 votes
against, 42 votes for and no abstentions, while Spanish Prime Minister
Mariano Rajoy pledged to halt any illegal referendums. Ironically, Rajoy
is a Galician and happens to be the grandson of one of the drafters of
the botched 1932 Galician Statute of Autonomy.

Despite the opposition from Madrid, Catalan Prime Minister Mas has
announced that after this month's regional elections he will carry on
preparing for the "public consultation," regardless of Madrid's
position.

The Catalans feel encouraged by events in Scotland, where the
Scottish National Party (SNP), which is governing the province, has
announced that within two years it will be holding a referendum on
Scottish independence. The Scottish situation is different from the one
in Catalonia, Flanders or Padania. Scotland is poorer and more leftist
than England. The Scots are even being subsidized by the English. They
reckon, however, that with the proceeds from North Sea oil flowing
directly into Scottish coffers, they would be better off than they are
today.

The international implications of Spain, Belgium, Italy and the
United Kingdom unraveling might be considerable. The Catalan, Flemish,
Padanian and Scottish nationalists have all indicated that they want to
remain members of the European Union. When Catalonia, Flanders, Padania
and Scotland secede, they become new nations and will have to reapply
for EU membership. Given that every EU member state can veto new
members, the governments of what remains of Spain, Belgium, Italy and
the United Kingdom would be able to block the accession of the seceded
entities.

However, as Catalonia, Flanders and Padania will be rich countries
and net contributors to the EU institutions in Brussels, it is unlikely
that the EU would refuse the new applicants' membership. As far as
Scotland is concerned, England is much more likely to leave the EU than
Scotland. Viviane Reding, the EU Commissioner for Justice, has already
indicated that Brussels would be ready to take a constructive attitude
toward a Catalan membership application.

But there will be implications for the United States as well. Given
that most Catalans, Flemish and Padanians are center-right, they are
much more pro-American than the remainder of Spain, Belgium and Italy.
Independent Catalonia, Flanders and Padania are likely to be trustworthy
allies of Washington. Their secessionist parties have all indicated
that they want to remain members of NATO. Here, too, the Scots differ
from the others. The SNP used to oppose NATO. With independence becoming
a serious possibility, however, the SNP has changed its position. At
last October's SNP party conference, it voted to ditch its 30-year
opposition to NATO. With 394 votes against 365 the SNP decided that
following Scotland's eventual independence in 2014 it would apply for
NATO membership.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said last week that the crisis in the
eurozone is likely to last for at least "five years or more" -- with
the eurocrisis putting ever more pressure on richer center-right regions
to pay for poorer leftist regions. As the former are increasingly
unwilling to pay for the latter, the strain on multi-ethnic nations in
Europe is growing. If the eurocrisis continues for another five years,
we might very well see an entirely different Europe – with a handful of
new nations – five years from now. Washington would be wise to take this
possibility into serious consideration.Peter MartinoSource: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3441/europe-secessionsCopyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

This has been a mean-spirited campaign, and the meanest, most destructive people won.So be it.

In
the last two Democratic administrations we have seen a sleazier,
angrier and more selfish part of America rising up more and more in our
political class. The Founders told us that ultimately our elected
politicians are a mirror of ourselves. Just like you, before November 7,
2012, I lived in the fervent hope that the degradation of the Clinton
and Obama years might be an exception to the long trend of American
history. But two times eight years of radical leftists in high office
can't be an accident. We can't just blame our sleazy media, or just the
leftist political class, as corrupt and malevolent as they truly are.

No
-- the balance of decency in America has changed. Every society has
normal, decent people and the other kind. The America we grew up in was
fundamentally decent. Decency was the expected standard.

Now the balance has changed.

The
evidence for our sleazified culture can be seen all around. It is in
our pop music, which has lost melody and now just has rhythm. We have a
President who won on revenge against middle class values. That's what he
meant by telling his people to vote for revenge. And they did --
showing us exactly who they are.

We are now a society divided between the makers and the takers, and the takers are on a campaign of theft and revenge.

We
have a President who takes dangerous pride in his hatred for
"middleclassness" as Jeremiah Wright taught him to believe. We have a
President who culminated his campaign with a ghetto singer rapping about
hoes and bitches, about drug-ridden and broken families, as if all
those cruelties were good.

This is not normal, decent America.

It is not.

We need to face that.

Morality
and values are not small things. The new tide in the affairs of America
also means that we can no longer be trusted to defend civilized values
around the world, as we have done for the last hundred years.

It's
a sea change. Fools around the world will applaud Obama as a savior,
but wise people will see us crumbling. They know they will be the worse
for it.

Today
the world is far more dangerous place than four years ago. If you
doubt that, keep an eye on the rise of barbarisms around the world.
Obama constantly facilitates barbarism, and the barbarians understand
that much better than decent people do.

History
buffs will remember that we've had decades of sleaze before. The
Founders were followed by Jacksonian corruption. Abraham Lincoln was
followed by Reconstruction. Yet we somehow found our way back.
Come-backs can happen, but probably not soon.

So
this is an elegiac moment, a moment of mourning for what has passed.
From Truman and Eisenhower to Bush 43 we have had leaders of character. No longer.

Republicans
by and large still look, act, and speak like normal, decent people. But
they have a hard time even understanding a thoroughly sleazified
America. Normal, decent people do not know how to live in this new,
barbaric society. We live in protected communities, we drive around in
SUVs, like armored cars.

The
left knows exactly how to act in this Brave New World. They've made it.
We are now ruled by sleazy demagogues who take bribes from foreign
nations that do not wish us well. Obama is the worst example so far.
Even the Clintons, both selfish narcissists, were somewhat better.

With
the decline of American decency, the civilized world has lost its
foremost defender. America wasn't a world power in earlier times of
corruption. We could afford to make mistakes. Today, our national decay
endangers the world. The left has purposely attacked our self-respect,
our pride in our morality and decency, and our crucial role in the
defense of civilized values. We are no longer the Leader of the Free
World, because we have lost -- for now -- the values that guided us.
America can no longer be trusted, as we saw so clearly in Benghazi and
the fraudulent Arab Spring. Any nation that places any trust in our
promises today is run by fools. Our allies must arm up to protect
themselves, or they must find new, trustworthy allies.

For
sixty years Europe has lived off our willingness to come to its
defense. The southern rim of Europe is now going bankrupt, and even
France looks ready to crumble. Without our leadership Europe has to rely
on itself, or on Russia, or on the spreading Muslim empires. But Europe
has shown no capacity to defend itself. Maybe they will learn. Or maybe
they will be swamped. We can no longer be trusted.

William
Butler Yeats's most famous poem, "The Second Coming," was written out
from overwhelming sense of social degradation in Europe in the 1920s and
30s. Years afterwards Yeats wrote that maybe he was anticipating the
rise of Hitler and Stalin, the two greatest evils that rose from the
rubble of World War I.

But Yeats wrote it for us, too:

Turning and turning in the widening gyreThe falcon cannot hear the falconer;Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhereThe ceremony of innocence is drowned;The best lack all conviction, while the worstAre full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;Surely the Second Coming is at hand.The Second Coming! Hardly are those words outWhen a vast image out of Spiritus MundiTroubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desertA shape with lion body and the head of a man,A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,Is moving its slow thighs, while all about itReel shadows of the indignant desert birds.The darkness drops again; but now I knowThat twenty centuries of stony sleepWere vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

James LewisSource: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/11/the_death_of_ordinary_decency.htmlCopyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.